A Sprint For Opportunities

The most frantically Ive seen people run sprints on city streets was during my days as a bachelor, back when I was living deep inside the belly of Johannesburg. Thieves would snatch handbags and cellphones, with screams of Vimba! stop him stabbing the smelly air.

Kutlwano Ditsele is familiar with these scenes of crime and despair and something that has kept running through his mind is the inequalities and the abandoned dreams of many living in the city, particularly the youth.

At its core, Netflixs new series, GO! is a story about opportunity, set against the backdrop of sport.

When my co-creator Thuli Zuma and I were developing the show, we kept coming back to one of the biggest drivers of inequality in South Africa access to opportunity. Some people have it and others dont, Ditsele says.

The high-stakes six-part series follows young sprinter Siya Bolt Gumede, who is given a life-changing scholarship to a prestigious school in Johannesburg.